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Commercial Printing Bulk – Ink Manufacturer
This customer is a bulk producer of ink for the commercial printing industry.
Application Description
This customer is a bulk producer of ink for the commercial printing industry. They need to provide their customers with small skids which are designed and built by the ink manufacturer to assit with the transfer of bulk ink into smaller day tanks.
Challenge
Ink is a notoriously difficult media to meter due to the chemical make up and consistency. The customer needed a flow meter that could accurately measure low flows in a 1/2" pipe, while being very easy to clean out during color changes. Because of the wide range of batch sizes, the meter also needed to have a large turn-down to accommodate both large and small flow rates.
Solution
The TRICOR Coriolis meter was recommended for this application because of its "no moving parts" design. The high viscosity of the ink, which usually causes a high pressure drop in PD meters, was not a problem for the TCM-3100 meter. With its 100:1 turn-down, the meter maintained the required accuracy over a large range of desired flow rates. By running the output from the TCM-3100 to a local PLC, the customer is able to ensure that the day tank is never overfilled while also maintaining control over how much ink the end-user is consuming over time.
Result
Solvent waste during the cleaning process was cut down by 75% and color change time was reduced by 50%. This allows the end-user to quickly change between colors to minimize the press down time while filling the day tanks for a run.